


it's highway robbery, and i kept my receipt

by jacyevans



Series: Highway Robbery [1]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Female Neal Caffrey, Gen, Genderbending, Male-Female Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-26
Updated: 2017-06-26
Packaged: 2018-11-19 03:37:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11304894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacyevans/pseuds/jacyevans
Summary: When Kate says goodbye, something in Neal's chest shatters. It’s nothing like getting thrown in jail - no, that was a minor set-back. This is a stone to the gut, a slap in the face, falling head-first into a pool of ice. By the time she catches her breath, Kate is already gone, and Neal is left alone with the destruction she leaves behind.





	it's highway robbery, and i kept my receipt

**Author's Note:**

> The idea of Neal being a woman is intriguing. Peter and Neal's bromance is my favorite part of the show, and I wondered how Neal being female would alter their relationship. What would the story would be like if the mystery of what happened to Kate was no mystery at all - she simply left. 
> 
> I wrote this fic years ago as short pieces to accompany a fanmix. While the base scenes are the same, I cleaned them up and made some adjustments so the story flowed better. I honestly forgot all about this fic until I went looking for another fic I wanted to read (and could not find *sobs*). But I found this, and I re-read it, and I forgot how good it was. 
> 
> And then I started writing a sequel. As you do.

When Kate says goodbye, something in Neal's chest shatters. It’s nothing like getting thrown in jail - no, that was a minor set-back. This is a stone to the gut, a slap in the face, falling head-first into a pool of ice. By the time she catches her breath, Kate is already gone, and Neal is left alone with the destruction she leaves behind.

Peter finds her sitting in the window of Kate's apartment, staring out at the sky, a bottle of an '82 Bordeaux hanging limply from her fingers.

"Hello Peter," Neal says without ever turning around; she doesn’t have to see him to know he’s arching his eyebrow, hands nowhere near his weapon.

She doesn’t carry; Peter knows she hates guns.

"How'd you know it was me?" He asks, not bothering to mask his footsteps against the tile.

"Your aftershave. You always wear the same scent." Neal turns her head, lips twisting into a mockery of a smile. "What is that, Old Spice?"

Peter shrugs. "El likes it."

Neal makes a noncommittal noise and stares down at the bottle in her hands. "I missed her by two days," she says quietly; for all of her bravado, Neal has a single weakness, one thing that breaks down her veneer of fancy clothes and fake smiles into something fragile, something she works too damn hard to keep hidden away for it to slip out in front of Agent Peter effing Burke.

_Kate._

"Was she worth it?"

Neal takes another sip from the bottle, pausing to let her eyes meet Peter's across the room. 

She swallows, tapping her fingers against the glass. "I'll let you know."

\--

A week later and she’s going crazy, restlessness jangling along her nerves in a way jail never made her feel before. She paces across her cell, staring at the smudged, black lines on the wall, counting down her days to freedom. The lamp hangs dark and useless from the ceiling - she hasn't bothered asking for a replacement bulb.

Peter’s visit is a breath of fresh air, and she can’t help but grin when he takes a seat across from her at the table.

He arches an eyebrow. “What do you want?”

Neal blinks, the faux picture of wide-eyed innocence. “Are you insinuating that I have ulterior motives? Peter, I’m insulted.”

Peter doesn't buy the act one bit. “You’re grinning.”

“Maybe I’m just happy to see you.”

“Neal.”

Neal rolls her eyes, but she pushes the papers at her elbow towards Peter. When she asked for the law book, the warden smirked, underestimating Neal's resolve, convinced she couldn't find a loophole out of jail with a compass and a map.

The only person who never underestimates her is Peter.

She takes a deep breath, finger pointing to the papers with a dull _thump_ against the table. “I want you to get me out of here,” she says, and Peter stares.

\--

Neal adapts to working at the FBI with the ease of a chameleon. Consulting on cases is a lot like running a con – charm the mark with batted eyelashes and larger-than-life promises, gain their trust while going behind their back and stealing all of their money.

Only now, the mark is dragged away in handcuffs while the money goes into an evidence bag and is shipped off to an FBI warehouse rather than a bank in a non-extradition country.

She slots herself into Peter’s team of agents like she’s always been there - flirting with Diana, trading friendly barbs with Jones, and annoying the hell out of Peter on a daily basis. Only the tracker on her ankle gives her away.

"You know, I'm pretty sure this thing is bad for my health."

Peter sighs the long-suffering sigh of a man who has heard this complaint a thousand times in the past three weeks, getting his annoyance across in a single, loud breath.

Neal wrinkles her nose, continuing to goad Peter on. "Look at it, Peter! It's chafing my leg."

"It's a tracking anklet, Neal, not an accessory."

"You say potato," she mutters, glaring at her feet. She catches Peter's lips twitching into a grin out of the corner of her eye.

\--

Neal finds Mozzie sitting at her kitchen table that night with a glass of her most expensive wine.

“You’re replacing that bottle,” Neal says without heat. Mozzie continues staring into his glass as he swirls the wine around. “How’d you get in here?”

“I scaled the building and broke one of the windows.”

Neal arches an eyebrow and smiles when Mozzie rolls his eyes. “The front door. June let me up when I told her I was one of your friends. She’s sweet.”

“She is,” Neal agrees; not many people would take a perfect stranger into their home, never mind an ex-con they met at a corner thrift shop.

“I don’t trust her.”

“Who do you trust, Moz?”

 _“The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them,”_ he says, holding up a finger. “Ernest Hemingway.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she says dryly, and Mozzie grins, saluting her with his glass before slugging back the dregs of his wine. The glass hits the table with a muted _clink._

Neal busies herself with grabbing another glass from the cabinet above the sink. “Any news on Kate?”

Mozzie’s smile falls. “She’s a leaf on the wind, my friend. Disappeared into thin air. She’s gone completely underground.”

“We have plenty of friends underground.”

“And you don’t think I’ve spoken to them? She’s a ghost, Neal.”

Neal turns, running a hand through her hair. “Just keep looking. Kate is out there somewhere and she’s in trouble, I know it.”

Mozzie looks like he wants to continue the argument, fruitless as it may be. He stands and pats Neal on the shoulder instead. “I’ll keep looking,” he murmurs, and Neal nods, muttering a thank you as he leaves. She drinks the rest of the wine straight from the bottle.

\--

She tracks down Peter's house the next morning, the sky grey and threatening a storm. They're following a lead on a bail jumper leaving a trail of real estate fraud and battered ex-partners across the city.

Peter barrels down the stairs like a man on a mission, shoving his phone into the crook of his neck while he slings his tie under his collar. "Honey, I have to go into the office, Neal esca-" He stares at Neal and Elizabeth, eyes wide and incredulous, like he can’t believe that of all the places Neal could have escaped outside of her radius, she ended up on his living room couch. 

Neal sits up straighter, secretly pleased - she so rarely surprises Peter anymore.

"Never mind, Jones, false alarm," Peter says, hanging up before Jones can get a word in edgewise.

"Hi honey," Elizabeth says airily, and Neal forces down the laughter threatening to spill out of her mouth when Peter tugs on the ends of his tie.

“Thought for once I would meet you at home and speed _you_ along. We have work today, you know.” Neal winks at Elizabeth and she grins, standing up to kiss Peter on the cheek.

Peter stares after Elizabeth before turning back to Neal. Satchmo crawls into her lap, twisting his head to the side so Neal can scratch behind his ear.

Peter throws up his hands. “Even the dog is against me.”

Neal rolls her eyes. “Really, Peter, must you be so melodramatic? You’re worse than a woman.”

“You were flirting with my wife,” he says, while he makes a valiant but awful attempt at getting his tie on straight.

Neal nudges Satchmo out of her lap and stands, reaching out to pull the knot in Peter’s tie undone. “Don’t get your tie in a twist, Peter. If I was inappropriate, Elizabeth would have kicked me to the curb before you even had a chance to come down here and defend her honor. It was harmless.”

He snorts. “You’re a lot of things, Neal, but harmless isn’t one of them.”

Peter drops a comment like this every now and again, reminding her that this isn't a real work relationship so much as another version of punishment. She lets the words roll off of her back. They sting on the way down.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Neal says with a grin, the one she hides behind when she’s charming a security guard before she breaks into a museum safe.

Peter frowns, but he doesn’t say anything else. 

\--

He makes up for it later. Jones and Diana are making nice with yet another jilted building owner around the corner. Neal offers her services, but Peter keeps her in the van; punishment, no doubt, for the stunt she pulled this morning at his house.

"So, I always wondered - why did your parents name you Neal?"

Because of all the names Wit Sec could have chosen, they chose this one. Neal's never allowed herself to question why. 

She wiggles her eyebrows. "My mom had a thing for Neil Armstrong," she says, and Peter huffs, rolling his eyes.

"Neal."

"What?" She flutters her eyelashes with a smirk. It scares her, how close they've grown, she and Peter Burke. Connections make you weak, makes it harder to turn your back and leave everything behind.

Makes it harder to run.

 _Maybe that's the point,_ a treacherous voice whispers. She scowls and stamps them down with a vicious, mental stomp, taking a scalding gulp of her coffee.

“You okay?” Peter asks, and Neal shrugs, crossing her ankles and uncrossing them when the tracker bangs against her shin.

“The van stinks,” she says, making a show of waving her hand back and forth in front of her nose, “And this coffee is stale.”

Peter purses his lips, lifting the two-way radio towards his mouth. "Jones, where are we?" She’s thankful for his patience - really, she is; Peter has the patience of a saint where she’s concerned - but she needs to find Kate. The thought thrums through her veins, keeping her up at night, a clock ticking down with time she doesn’t have.

\--

They find their bail jumper at an upscale club, the kind frequented by the rich and famous, and the people pretending to be rich and famous. Neal makes an easy mark, amps up her makeup and dons a slinky dress, the slit on the side drawing the perp’s eyes away from her other, tracker-laden ankle.

Tess No-Last-Name skims Neal’s body from head to toe, hand reaching high on her thigh as they share a drink at the bar. Her mouth is warm against Neal’s ear as Tess invites her to a private room in the back. Neal ignores Peter's voice in her ear telling her to wait for backup, takes out her earpiece when Tess’ back is turned, and drops it into her glass of champagne.

She grins, pressing her lips to Tess’ throat as she wraps an arm around Neal’s waist, letting her press Neal back against the wall. She makes a tactical error, slinging her leg around Tess’ thighs, flashing her anklet.

"What the hell is that?" She asks, just as the man standing guard flings the curtain open and whispers something into Tess’ ear.

Tess spins Neal around, slamming her face-first into a wall just as Peter and his team bust into the room, guns held aloft.

If Peter and Diana had been even a minute later... She shuts the thought out of her mind with a slow shake of her head as Diana sits her down at the back of an ambulance.

"My knights in shining armor," she says, hissing as the medic presses an ice pack to her cheek. He mumbles out an apology.

Peter maneuvers Neal's face in his direction with gentle fingers, pushing the ice pack out of the way, still managing to avoid the bruise blossoming purple and painful on her cheek.

“Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

Neal scoffs. “I had it under control.”

He waves the paramedics away. Peter waits until they’re out of hearing range to ask the question Neal has been dreading for weeks.

“This is about Kate, isn’t it?”

Neal tosses the ice pack into the back of the ambulance and shoves up to her feet, only wobbling a little in her heels. “Come on, Peter -”

Peter grasps her wrist, gentle enough not to feel threatening but firm enough to keep her from walking away. “Damn it, Neal. When are you going to get it into your head? Kate is gone.”

“You don’t know that,” Neal bites out, voice barely louder than a whisper. 

“Don’t I? You haven’t heard from her, not one word since you got out. She hasn’t made an effort to contact you, has she?”

Neal shakes her head, aborting the move when the ground spins. “That doesn’t mean she’s gone for good.”

“You’re so far in denial, you can’t see what’s right in front of you. She left you. She isn’t coming back.”

Neal rips her wrist out of his grip, clenching her hands into fists to control the trembling she hopes Peter doesn’t notice.

“You don‘t know Kate, and you sure as hell don’t know me,” she hisses, and Diana stops at Peter’s back, startled at the venom in her voice.

Neal turns and walks away, and Peter waves at Jones to let her go.

\--

For the next several hours, Neal wanders.

Peter calls, and she pounds her finger against _Ignore._ Let him check her damn anklet if he wants to find her so badly.

Her feet ache in her shoes, and the bruise on her cheek throbs with every thump of her heart, so she can barely see straight. Anger claws at her chest like some dark, insidious beast, aware in some deep, lost part of herself that Peter is right. 

Lightning flashes across the horizon. Somewhere in the distance, thunder claps. She hails a cab at the next corner just as it starts to rain, glad for the dark interior that keeps her face hidden. They don’t hit any traffic as they leave the city, sliding over the bridge and neatly into Queens.

She throws cash at the driver and slips out without waiting for the change. The house looms ahead, a light in the window the only sign anyone is home. Neal climbs the stairs, mind carefully blank as she rings the bell. 

The door swings opens, revealing Elizabeth Burke on the other side.

"Neal," Elizabeth says, unsurprised to find her standing on her doorstep in the middle of the night. She even has a towel ready.

"Come in," she says, stepping aside to allow Neal inside. Neal sits on the couch, draping the towel across her shoulders, still warm from the dryer. She runs her fingers absently through Satchmo's fur when he crawls into her lap. Elizabeth sits down beside her and lifts her face, fingers as gentle as Peter's as she brushes her hair to the side. "I'll get you some ice." 

"Don't." Neal grips her arm as she moves to stand. "Just - stay here with me?"

Elizabeth does, her presence comforting while the weight of Neal's silence threatens to choke.

"Kate isn't coming back, is she?" She whispers, finally breaking.

Elizabeth sighs. "No, honey," she says, concerned without an ounce of unwelcome pity. "I don’t think she is."

The dam breaks as swiftly as the storm, rain pounding against the windows as every emotion Neal held back over the past few months rushes to the surface. Neal doesn’t cry - hasn’t since she was a child playing with the boys, scraping her palms and her knees on rough concrete at every opportunity. Working with Mozzie isn’t much different, the world of cons and thieves a boy’s club that takes time, patience, and resilience to penetrate. She tries to pull away from Elizabeth as her eyes fill with tears, tries to bury the emotions back down.

Elizabeth holds her hand tighter, wraps her arm around her shoulders. The tears spill over. 

Elizabeth doesn’t let go. 

\--

Neal glances up when the door opens an indeterminable amount of time later. Peter stops halfway into his own home, and she focuses on the rain-spots darkening his suit instead of his face.

Elizabeth murmurs assurances against her temple, smoothing a hand through her hair as she stands. She disappears up the stairs with nothing but a few brief, whispered words to Peter. He dithers in the doorway, pausing a moment before sitting next to Neal on the couch. He rests his palms on his thighs. Neal wipes a hand over her face. She probably looks like hell.

“You okay?” he asks, the words sincere despite being awkward and clunky in his mouth. He doesn’t apologize. That’s okay; Neal doesn’t either.

She shrugs. “I’m here,” she says, giving him a pained half-smile that's no less genuine for the effort.

Peter reaches out, fingers tentative as he touches her shoulder, squeezing when she doesn’t pull away. “Yeah, you’re here.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the always wonderful thatworldinverted for the beta and for assuring me that my pairing plans were founded, and to dream_mancer for laughing at me when I told her this was happening. Love you, too, brain twin :-P
> 
> Come hang out with me on [tumblr](jacyevans.tumblr.com) if you enjoy flailing tags and random fandom spams. I like new friends :)


End file.
